34 Hoiv to Pay for iJic War 



pulling together, and of a square deal, rather than one of 

 holding aloof and of striving to gain unneighbourly 

 advantage." 



Such ideas appeal to us strongly, and we cannot help 

 adding that there should be no need to issue such an 

 appeal in the first place, nor, having been issued, of such a 

 prophet crying in the wilderness to apparently deaf ears, 

 as he has to do, since no one seems willing to listen to his 

 excellent advice. As we stand to-day, both in England 

 and America, the lower-class politicians (socially speaking), 

 who have crept into the " most-high places," where they 

 are doing excellent work on every point but this one, seem 

 unable (either they or their subordinates who look to them 

 for light and guidance), owing to their previous training and 

 general environments having narrowed their outlook on life, 

 to appreciate what they owe to the Tropics, and how this 

 country would miss the supplies of necessities and semi- 

 luxuries that thev send us if they were cut off. Their 

 inability to realize this has always had the tendency to 

 cause the Tropics, the industries that exist there, and 

 above all the men who have made those industries, to 

 be looked upon as so many milch cows, which only exist 

 to be milked as dry as possible for the good of the 

 exchequer at home, and the public have yet to learn how 

 much more milk can be obtained and how the quality can 

 be improved by careful training and selection and by 

 supplying the animals from the start with all they need. 

 Meanwhile the ordinary man-in-the-street on this side, the 

 borough councillor and town employee, &c. (none of whom 

 are engaged in wealth or food-producing industries and 

 whose labour and pay tend to become more or less 

 parasitic on the wealth-producers), since they are selfish 

 (or wise) enough to stop at home in safety and comfort 

 instead of risking their health, lives, and money in pushing 

 the trade and influence of the Empire abroad, are thus 

 able, being resident on this side, to secure enough votes to 

 enable them, in the aggregate, to do the wire-pulling 

 necessary to secure an almost unfairly large share of the 

 benefits of the settled life and administration over here, 

 whilst they are tending, at the same time, to shift their 

 share of taxes on to those who least deserve to be burdened 

 with them because their labour on the whole is of far 

 greater use to the Empire. On no one does this burden 

 fall so heavily in these times of war as on the smaller 

 individual, tropical pioneer, exporter, trader and agri- 

 culturist residing on this side, or who is running an office 



